Tipping the Scales
by BrownieFox
Summary: Tony adopts a Spiderkid into the Avengers fold, and finds it's a bit harder than he expected. Or: in which everybody wants to mentor a teenage vigilante, Tony learns that vigilante's are pathological liars, Matt Murdock didn't ask for any of this, and Peter just wants to learn to throw a really good punch. A mix of a team as family and daredevil reveal fic
1. Chapter 1

For the most part, vigilantes don't really appear on the Avengers' radar.

In Tony's defense, it had very little to do with the vigilantes as individuals and much more to do with the fact that they're vigilantes. The Avengers, on the other hand, are Heroes with a capital 'H'. Tony and the other Avengers tend to keep to their forte - big, life-threatening villians that tear up all of New York and plan to conquer the world - while vigilantes have their own, more close to home focus - beating up muggers and stopping bank robberies, maybe taking down the occasional villain, lowercase 'v'. As far Tony was concerned, it was a good balance. They both had their purposes in this rather messed-up society.

There was once a time when Tony would hear something about one of them and show interest, such as the bombings in Hell's Kitchen supposedly done by a mysterious Man in Black who would later be known as Daredevil. Of course, Tony's interest was mostly in part with Daredevil being the first vigilante of New York, soon followed by various others. New York was loaded with crime, plenty for any and all vigilantes that wanted to make a living punching people in the face. It also turned out that Daredevil was framed by a man of the name Wilson Fisk, and vigilantes being framed by their respective villains became quite a trend. Tony had JARVIS - and then eventually FRIDAY - monitor vigilante news and keep tabs on it, but rarely viewed the news himself. Best not to mess the vigilante-Hero balance.

Or that was the _plan, _until Tony Stark met Spiderman, who was really Spiderkid, and then took Spiderkid to Germany to fight a bunch of other Avengers. And now Tony Stark was responsible for the kid, having introduced the vigilante - and what child goes out a fights crime?! - to the Hero side of things. For the most part, Spiderman did still keep to his patrolling around and shooting webs at bad guys. But Tony now felt responsible for what happened to him, and he had nobody to blame but himself.

So when Peter shows up to his internship - which was a great excuse to check up on the kid as well as being an actual legit thing - with some bruises and a split lip, Tony decides that that's it, enough is enough. It's bad enough having a fifteen-year-old running around New York punching dudes, it's worse having one running around that doesn't know how to really fight or defend himself.

When Tony had pitched the idea to the kid, he'd expected some backlash. Peter did have some extreme superstrength going on, he could definitely handle himself relying solely on that. Tony had a whole speech prepared about the trials and tribulations of being a Hero and that it was totally possible Peter would meet somebody whose strength could match his own and that numbers can overwhelm strength and also bullets and lasers were quite effective and can't really be punched. But Peter seemed excited by the prospect, eagerly accepting the offer. It brought a smile to Tony's face.

Which is how Tony found himself finally formally introducing Peter 'Spiderman' Parker to other the Avengers 0 with Peter's permission of course - so that those on the team that didn't just shoot laser beams at their enemies could teach the kid a thing or two.

"This is Peter." Tony gestured the teenager, who waved at the other Avengers. Said teenager was standing on the ceiling of the common room, which was pretty far up, just for the drama of it all.

"Oh wow. I'm, really meeting you guys." Peter said, sounding gobsmacked. The others didn't look too surprised that Tony's intern was on the ceiling, which really, what was the point of taking a vigilante under your wing if you don't get to show off a bit?

"Spiderman, I presume?" Natasha said with a delicately raised eyebrow. Peter dropped down from the ceiling, landing in a crouch, bare feet on the carpet. He stood up and put out a hand to the Avengers that Tony had gathered together. It wasn't all of them, just Natasha, Steve, Clint, and Sam. After the whole Accords fallout, most of the other Avengers decided to take a 'break' from living in the tower, and getting them all together for anything less than a mission or movie night was quite the chore and usually required bribes. Natasha shook the offered hand, as did Steve, Clint, and Sam in turn.

"We've met before." Steve said as he shook Peter's hand and Peter ducked his head.

"Meeting during a battle doesn't count as meeting." Clint pointed out.

"Sorry about that. The, uh, Tony-" Peter floundered around for words. Steve saved him with a pat on the back and a warm smile.

"Hey, it's alright. That's behind us now." Steve reassured him. Tony didn't miss how his eyes flicked over to him, though, and Tony dropped his gaze.

The Accords, as well as the Winter Soldier Fiasco, were an absolute mess that was better left unmentioned when possible. The remaining Avengers had returned to a very awkward and lonely tower. The Accords became more of a nuisance than a help as Villians realized that, now that the Avengers had so many hoops to jump through, they could wreak havoc and be on their merry way before the Heroes could set foot on the warzone. The Winter Soldier thing… the more left unsaid about it the better. At the end of the day, the Accords were pulled (though currently there was supposedly something else to take their place in the works) and Tony learned to suck up his pride and eat crow to get the rest of the Avengers back on the team. Things were still tense, but Tony hadn't realized how used to having them, having so many _friends, _he'd gotten until they were all gone.

"Isn't he a little young to be an Avenger?" Sam asked, quirking an eyebrow, and next to Tony Peter bristled slightly.

"The kid can lift an airplane, are you really going to try telling him what he can and can't do?" Tony shot back and Sam gave a conceding shrug at that. "Anyway, Peter's more like a Backup Avenger, he's more into that vigilante stuff." Tony patted Peter on the back. "But Peter's also never learned to fight."

"You want us to teach him." Clint put the pieces together.

"_I _want you to teach me." Peter stepped forward. "I'm strong, but I could be so much _better _if I knew what I was doing." Tony grinned and looked at the other four. Natasha folded her arms, eyes flicking over Peter appraisingly.

"If I were to teach you, it will not be easy. I won't be teaching you as I was taught, but it would still be intense. I'll demand only your best, all of your focus. Will you be able to give me that?" Natasha asked, eyes somehow managing to be emotionless, like she didn't care what Peter answer, and yet intense at the same time.

"Yes, yeah, of course." Peter said with only a fraction of a second of hesitation. Natasha continued to stare at him until she had Peter fidgeting under the scrutiny. Finally, she nodded with the barest of smiles.

"Well, I don't know what I have to offer that the Black Widow doesn't," Sam said, "But sure, I'm willing to give it a try."

"Sure, why not?" Clint said with a shrug.

"Just as long as you don't steal my shield from me again." Steve agreed, actually smirking a bit as Peter started sputtering for an excuse or explanation. Tony grinned again.

"Well, why don't you get started?" Tony gestured to the elevator, grin widening as the five headed down to the gym. Maybe Peter wasn't an Avenger, and Tony didn't really want to be the one responsible for adding a kid for the roster, but having them all in one place felt right. Peter cast one look back at Tony, looking half overjoyed to be surrounded by Heroes, the other half very clearly begging Tony to come along. Tony just chuckled and waved as the elevator doors shut. "Keep him in one piece, would ya?"

oOo

"He's got a lot of promise." Steve said as he entered the kitchen. Clint and Sam weren't with him, probably having headed back to their respective homes, but Natasha walked in behind him. "Maybe a little rough around the edges, but there's a lot there to work with."

"Did you break any of his bones? Did he break any of your bones?" Tony asked, excited to hear about how the training had gone. It wasn't that he hadn't wanted to be there for whatever the four Avengers had in mind for training a spider vigilante, but he also wanted to know if the kid would sink or swim if left with other Heroes. Could be something important to know for team-ups with other Avengers, or who knew, maybe even other vigilantes.

"No, we didn't do anything intense yet. Mostly just sent him through an obstacle course, any weapon proficiency, see how he did in some basic hand-to-hand. Sam mentioned Peter caught Bucky's arm no problem, and I'm the one who dropped the jet bridge on him to begin with, but it's still amazing seeing his strength in action." Steve grabbed a cup out of the cupboard while Natasha went rooting through the fridge for something to eat and Tony did his best to hide his flinch as the mention of Bucky. "He managed to flip Natasha at one point, though I think that had more to do with his powers than skill."

"He flipped Nat?! FRIDAY, please tell me we have a recording of that."

"_We do. I'll project it for you right now." _FRIDAY's voice filtered through the speakers and a hologram appeared on the kitchen island. It showed Natasha circling Peter like a shark, all poise and self-assuredness. The audio in the video was crystal-clear, and there was clearly no sound made by her feet. Peter's arms were up in fists and he was moving in a much smaller circle, keeping his eyes on Natasha. In a flash Natasha lunged forward and Peter ducked down. It was hard to see exactly what happened, but a second later Natasha was flipping through the air. She landed neatly on her feet, but her surprise was evident on her face.

"It was impressive." Natasha agreed. "FRIDAY, could you replay the video?"

"I can't believe you let the kid even touch you." Tony elbowed Natasha. She shrugged, still looking at the video.

"We've got to give him something to work with." She touched the video and rewound it, playing it slower, analyzing it like he'd seen her do with other videos of spars. "He hasn't had any previous training?"

"No?" Tony was fairly sure he hadn't, but then again he didn't know Peter's entire life story. Natasha nodded. "Far as I know, he's kind of a Captain America with 'sick until super powers' kind of deal. Hey, maybe you guys can talk about that!" Steve gave a huff of laughter.

"Yeah, guess we could." He was smiling, which was good. There were days Steve could barely stand to be in the same room in Tony (or Tony couldn't be in the same room as Cap) but today was a good day for both of them. They were becoming more frequent than the bad ones. "He seems like a good kid."

"He does. He is." Tony said, a warm smile gracing his face as he thought about Peter. "Maybe I should teach him how to use the Ironman suit-"

"Tony," Steve said in a 'Captain-America-thinks-this-is-a-bad-idea' tone, which really just made Tony want to teach Peter more. A few adjustments and it could probably fit him, even just for a short while… "Tony! He's a kid!"

"The suit is totally safe. It is!" Tony defended to Steve's disbelieving flat look. Natasha smirked at them as she ate some leftover chinese takeout.


	2. Chapter 2

"Okay, go."

Sam hit the stopwatch and Peter, in his Spiderman suit, ran straight at Stark Tower - and then started scaling it. It was Peter's third day of training, chosen to be later in the evening this time, and the Avengers were still trying to figure out a schedule that worked with Peter's schooling, as well as figuring out a good workout routine for somebody enhanced like Peter. Steve was able to give them some good ideas, having super strength himself, but the fact still remained that Peter needed either some pretty specialized equipment to challenge him, or they were going to have to get creative.

Hence swapping out a rockwall for an entire building.

It was also the first time Tony was allowing himself to tag along and see how the training was going. Clint was waiting for Peter at the top of the building and Sam was circling it, ready to catch the kid if he fell, which left Steve, Natasha, and Tony at the bottom.

"So what's next, going to the trainyard and lifting abandoned train cars?" Tony joked. He was met with silence. "Wait, please tell me that's on the agenda. Please, I'm begging you, tell me you're planning to make the miraculous spider boy lift train cars."

"It's not… off the list." Steve conceded, avoiding Tony's eyes as he scratched the back of his head self-conciously.

"Oh my god, this is the actual best day of my life." Tony laughed, wiping fake tears from his eyes. Natasha kept her eyes on Spiderman as he continued to scale the building, making pretty good time as far as Tony was concerned. "Anyway, what did I miss from last time?" The last training, Tony hadn't gone to. Not because he hadn't wanted to, but because it had been one of the Bad days between him and Steve, and he didn't want to make Peter watch him strangle and/or be strangled by America's Golden Boy. All four of the other Avengers had left right after Peter had apparently announced he had 'patrol' to be on, and God that must be annoying, and when did the kid sleep? And sure, Tony could and did look at the recordings that FRIDAY had so nicely held on to, but he was dying to hear more about what his fellow Heroes thought about Peter.

"We went more over weapons than combat." Natasha said. "We're still trying to get a good read and baseline to work with for him. He didn't seem to know much about guns, although…" She trailed off, which was very unlike her, and it sent a chill up Tony's spine. Her question on whether Peter had had training before came back to the forefront of his mind, and now he turned it over, starting to realize there may've been more to it than he'd originally thought. What had Natasha noticed that first day?

"He liked the big guns." Steve finished for Natasha, and Tony frowned.

"I mean, he's a teenager, so that checks out." Steve and Natasha shared a look..

"He was more comfortable with the big guns, guns designed with the express purpose of killing other human beings." Natasha explained.

"Not that he was afraid of the handguns," Steve added, "And it wasn't like he was hitting bull's eyes with any of the guns, but he wasn't surprised by the recoil, or the holes they left in the targets."

"And you're sure it's not just violent video game desensitization? Or, hey, he has super strength, maybe he just didn't notice the recoil?" Tony suggested and Steve's shoulders stiffened. Tony breathed in a deep breathe, knowing that now was a good time to start choosing words a bit more carefully. "I'm not doubting you," Tony said and though Steve clearly thought otherwise, just saying it made the supersoldier relax a bit more, "But Peter's fifteen, he's a math and science nerd, he had health problems before getting bit by a radioactive spider. I don't think he's some kind of child soldier or whatever it is you're trying to imply."

"We're not trying to imply that," Natasha soothed, but now it was Tony's turn to look disbelieving, "But I do think you should consider how well you really know Peter Parker. Who's to say that being Spiderman is the only secret he keeps?"

Tony's stomach rolled around uncomfortably at the implications that Peter could be hiding some dangerous secret. The worst part was that he was well aware Natasha knew what she was talking about, being a master of secrets herself. After finding out Spiderman's identity and Tony's initial dig into Who Is Peter Parker, after he'd gotten to know Peter himself a bit more, he'd tried to make an effort to leave the kid some privacy - which, really, for Tony who loved to know things, was no small feat. Now, though, hearing that there may be something he missed, it made his anxiety spike.

"I'll talk to him." Tony promised. Steve made a move like he was going to put a hand on Tony's shoulder and then aborted the movement, hand falling to his side and just settling for giving Tony an empathetic look.

"I'm sure there's a good answer." God, Steve sounded like he believed that. Tony prayed he was right.

"Well, we've got a base for how fast he can climb the tower." Sam landed in front of them, oblivious to the conversation that had just happened, as well as the slight tension in the air.. "Don't really know if it's making good time or bad time for a mutated teenager, but we have it. I guess we try and improve it? I'd suggest eventually having him try to evade attacks while climbing, but I don't want to destroy the tower or scare the civilians…" Sam's voice trailed off.

"We'll figure something out." Tony assured, already starting to think about cloaking mechanisms, or what if the rock wall inside went up the entire building… "What's up next?"

oOo

Tony managed to catch Peter before he left.

"You're not going out on patrol this late at night, are you?" Tony asked with a raised eyebrow as Peter slipped into his Spiderman suit, having taken it off when they got inside for the rest of the training, which consisted mostly of testing out how comfortable Peter was with various weapons. They had a rather large collection, most of which were Natasha's. She clearly went easy on Peter with all of them, but that wasn't to say she didn't easily establish that she was extremely proficient with each and every weapon in their arsenal. Hell, Tony wouldn't be surprised if she had no trouble piloting one of the Ironman suits.

"Swinging home as Peter Parker seems like an easy way to get my identity revealed." Peter said with a smile and a shrug. He'd taken a pretty bad hit from Natasha at one point that had looked like it was going to bruise, and it had, but it was already basically healed. Man, what Tony wouldn't give for a healing factor like that.

"You still want to do this? It's going to start getting harder, once they figure out exactly how to train you. I mean, you've never gone through intense training, or any kind of battle training of any kind before, right?" Nice Tony, being really smooth here. Just slipped it right in. Peter was looking down at his mask, rubbing at the fabric with his thumb.

"Actually," Peter started and Tony's heart sank. No, maybe it's nothing bad. Don't get upset yet Tony. Hadn't he already learned what happened when he acted before thinking? "I have been taught… self defense. Just a bit. From my Spanish tutor."

"Spanish Tutor?" Tony couldn't keep the surprise out of his voice as his heart soared. Of course, he was overreacting for nothing. "Don't you have A's in Spanish?"

"Yeah, because I have a tutor. We meet twice a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays after school. I, probably should've mentioned that. You guys probably need to know that. For when we're scheduling, uh, more training and stuff." Peter continued to rub at the fabric of his mask, not meeting Tony's eyes, and Tony gave a huff of amusement.

"Did you think I was going to be upset? That you had a tutor?" Tony asked incredulously. Peter fidgeted.

"I don't know, maybe. Or maybe you'd try to convince me to drop him, y'know, since I already have a lot going on, but my Spanish has gotten so much better! I'm really making progress, uh, understanding stuff." Tony sighed, rolled his eyes, and smiled.

"Alright, you can keep learning Spanish. But maybe try to sleep at some point?"

"Like you're one to talk?" Peter teased right back, finally seeming to be past whatever nerves he'd been tackling. All over Spanish? Tony shook his head fondly.

"Get out of here before May comes for my head." Tony lightly shoved his shoulder. Peter smiled brilliantly, pulling the mask back on and leaping off of the top of Avengers' tower, into the night. Tony walked closer to the edge and looked out at the city lights, watching as a thread of white connected with a building and Spiderman's freefall turning into an arch, swinging him back up to the sky. Tony could just make out a 'WHOOP!' and chuckled slightly. Damn, the kid had really just grown on him like mold.

"He's not going to be patrolling tonight, is he? Doesn't he have school tomorrow?" Tony hadn't noticed Clint come up behind him and flinched. And then realized that Peter had never answered his first question.

"Shit. Peter!"

oOo

"He's late." Natasha observed. She didn't sound judgemental of it, just stating a fact.

"I'll call him." Tony sighed, pulling his phone out of his pocket. Natasha shook her head.

"No, don't." Clint said this time. The three of them were waiting outside of Avengers' Tower for their web-crawling friend. Today was the first day Peter could be late, the first of an actual concrete schedule after a couple weeks of crazy and sporadic training. "I want to see if he's coming or not."

"There'll have to be consequences for not showing up." Natasha mused.

"No, there doesn't." Tony frowned. "He's a kid, Nat, he does have a lot of things going on. And we scheduled it on a Tuesday evening. He's probably just learning how to say 'sorry I'm late' in Spanish." Natasha shrugged.

"I told him I needed his full focus and devotion. He wanted us to teach him." Natasha pointed out. Tony couldn't argue with that. He sighed.

"Only if Steve and Sam agree with whatever it is." He requested. They weren't here today. Today was going to be spy training or something, whatever it was that Natasha and Clint could do that Steve and Sam couldn't. Somehow, this had become less of 'make sure Peter has basic skills to stay alive on them there streets' and more 'train the boy to really be an Avenger', which, okay, Tony really did want Peter to be an Avenger when he was older, so he was completely on board with this.

"I'm not going to do anything that was done to me." Natasha said, voice smooth as silk and setting Tony's fight-or-flight instinct on edge.

"Of course not! I didn't think you would! I'm just saying, maybe wait for the other two first." He defended himself.

"Oh, it's Peter!" Clint pushed off the side Avengers Tower, which he'd been leaning against. Then his face positively lit up. "And he's with Matt!"

"Matt?" Tony asked. He looked down the street. Peter was walking towards them, clearly talking about something. There was a man next to him, an adult man who was holding on to Peter's arm and Tony took a protective step forward before he noticed the white cane the man was holding in his other hand and the dark pair of glasses on his face. A blind dude? Where did Peter pick him up? "Who's Matt?"

"Oh, he's my lawyer." Clint clarified. "Well, him and Foggy."

"You're never told me about a Matt." Natasha said, once again in that very carefully not judgemental voice. Clint didn't seem affected by it, just waving over at Peter and Matt. Peter waved back, still walking a steady pace.

"He's new, helping Laura and I with a stupid thing." At the curious looks from both Tony and Natasha, the archer sighed, rolling his eyes. "Some people were trying to sue us over something stupid and he's helping us out. Don't worry about it, it's just domestic normal-people stuff, really. Not everything comes back to being Avengers, Tony."

"- that you won't need any help heading back?" Tony caught the tailend of what Peter said to Matt.

"Now that I know the way, I should be fine." Matt said.

"We're here, by the way… Oh! Uh, Tony, Clint, and Natasha are just to our right." Peter narrated as he and Matt came to a stop before the three Avengers. Matt let go of Peter's arm and rested both of his hands on top of his cane, face directed in their general direction. There was a small kind of half-smile-almost-smirk on his face. Peter turned his attention to the Avengers, looking sheepish. "Sorry I'm late, but Matt wanted to meet you guys. He's heard about my internship," Peter stressed the word internship, and Tony prayed that Clint and Natasha would be teaching him something about subtlety, "And wanted to meet you guys. And see how far it was from, uh, his office, to know how long we have to study, now that I have this afterwards."

"Matthew Murdock," Matt extended his hand and Tony and Natasha shook it cordially, and then as Clint shook his hand, said, "And you wouldn't happen to be the same Clint I'm thinking of, would you?"

"Good to see you, Matt." Clint said, grinning.

"Can't say it's quite mutual." Matt grinned back, "Sorry, we're still working through some of the information we got back from the vet, it's going to be a bit longer before we can move your case along."

"Hey, it's all good, I know you and Foggy have almost more clients than you can handle." Peter looked between Clint and Matt.

"Wait, you guys know each other?" Peter gaped, and Matt shrugged a bit.

"He's a client. A little out of the way, but when Foggy and Karen heard the case involved a dog, I really didn't have a choice but to take it." Matt had a fond smile on his face as he said 'Foggy and Karen'. Clint had mentioned 'Foggy' too, which, what the hell kind of name was Foggy? Oh Tony was so totally doing some digging on this dude.

"How do you know Peter?" Natasha asked.

"I'm his Spanish tutor." Matt said with an easy going smile, head tilting ever-so-slightly to the side. "Didn't he tell you he has Spanish lessons on Tuesdays and Thursdays?" Okay, Tony probably should've figured that out, but to be fair he'd been so caught up in the fact that Clint knew the stranger that Peter was with, and that that stranger was a lawyer. And also blind, which shouldn't make a difference but also still surprised Tony. Speaking of which…

"You just… tutor kids on the side?" Tony asked suspiciously.

"Not usually, no. We have more clients than we know what to do with. But I helped him and his aunt with some legal trouble a bit ago, and while Foggy went over the details with May, Peter and I would go over Spanish. It just kind of stuck." He shrugged. "What can I say, Peter's a good kid, and he's shown some real and impressive improvement." Peter grinned at that, wide and bright and blinding. Matt's hand went to his other wrist, touching something there and sighing, "Well, it was nice meeting you three, but I should start heading back to the office if I'm going to be back in time to get anything done."

Matt waved and set off back down the street, cane tapping as he made his way to wherever his office was.

"Sorry I'm late," Peter apologized once more, "But Matt was insistent on coming. I swear, it won't take that much time getting from Spanish to here. Next time I'll be swinging."

"See? A totally legit and perfectly valid reason." Tony gestured at Peter proudly.

"An excuse is still an excuse." Natasha pointed out. "But… I suppose we can let it go this once. I was curious myself who this Spanish tutor of yours was. From here on out, though, I expect you to be on time, if not early. Every second of your training is important and should be treated as such." Peter nodded seriously.

"Yes, of course. I promise, I'll do my absolute best." Peter said as the four of them moved inside of the tower.

"And now I get to tell you that the 'serious training' you're doing today is playing hide-and-seek in the tower. You get to hide, and Nat and I get to hunt you down with paintball guns."


End file.
